ROMANO-BRITISH LEICESTERSHIRE 



Wall Street 62 (now in situ under the Great Central Railway Station). 

 The town council improved this district in 1882, and further discoveries 

 were made. It was found that the pavement continued under the adjoin- 

 ing house and under the street. Fragments of painted wall plaster were 

 also discovered, but the walls appear to have been removed, probably 

 for building purposes. 63 The pavement is a square of 23 ft., the design of 

 the mosaic consisting of nine panels divided from each other by bands of 

 braidwork. The panels are rilled with elaborate geometrical compositions, 

 and the whole is framed by two bands, one of simple braidwork, the outer 

 and larger of a frieze of flowers and leaves in flattened circles. The design 

 is evidently a translation into mosaic of a coffered ceiling, the outer bands 

 taking the place of frieze and cornice. The materials and colours of the 

 tesserae are as follows : Black, perhaps slate ; blue grey, lias ; green grey, 

 possibly limestone ; yellow in two shades, perhaps brick from its crude colour, 

 or it may be an oolite. The white ground is either a limestone, or perhaps 

 from its clearness, from the beds of the lower chalk. The reds in three 

 shades are all brick. The use of the grey green (sage green) tesserae in the 

 floor gives it a much softer look than most pavements, and offers a marked 

 contrast to the mosaics of the southern counties. As for the tesserae the 

 size is pretty constant everywhere in this country, the larger being ij in. 

 more or less and the smaller in. or less. In this instance the larger are 

 only f in. square. They always approximate to a square in shape, but are 

 cut to fit a space if required. The larger sizes are only used as grounds for 

 finer work, for borders, or for the pavement of corridors. This pavement 

 is one of the finest of its kind in England (plate III). 



In 1885 a tesselated pavement was found in excavating under the 

 premises of Messrs. Kimpson and Howell in Sarah Street, Old Bath Lane. 

 It measured about 12 ft. or 14 ft. by 3ft. or 4ft., and was in good preserva- 

 tion, the pattern distinct, the tesserae rather coarse. A small piece was 

 exhibited at a meeting of the Leicestershire Archaeological Society by Mr. 

 Freer in 1886. The level was below the surface of the river and considerably 

 lower than the pavement discovered in Jewry Wall Street. Two columns in 

 the Leicester Museum (Nos. 18-19) are sa ^ to have been found in this place." 



About ten years before, in the same street, while some drainage works 

 were being carried out, a bed of concrete composed of lime and finely broken 

 tiles was disclosed, 9 ft. from the surface. In some places the concrete was a 

 foot thick and extended for 20 ft. in length, it was not explored in any 

 other direction ; the surface was quite smooth, and rested on a bed of black 

 mould from 4 ft. to 5 ft. in depth, below which were marl and gravel. The 

 flooring was intersected by a rough foundation, apparently the angle of a 

 building, one side being curved. Some thick walls of coarse masonry were 

 also found, one running parallel to the street, north and south, and two others 

 crossing it at right angles. Beneath the floor a passage or conduit was 

 discovered leading to the river." 



" Thompson, Hist. Lite. App. A. 445. 



" Assoc. Arch. Sue. xviii, lix ; Thompson, Hist. Lelc. App. A. 445 ; Fox, Arch. Journ. xlvi, 62 ; MS. 

 Min. Soc. Antiq. x, 196. 



** Guide to Lelc. Museum ; Antiq. xii, 228 ; Lelc. Arch. Soc. vi, 210 ; ix, 175; Fox, Arch. Journ. xlvi, 62. 

 15 Lelc. Arch. Soc. ii, 22 ; v, 41 ; Fox, Arch. Journ. xlvi, 62. 



195 



